Lovely Cadiz

Cadiz - my favorite place so far in the trip to Southern Spain

Sunday, November 11, 2012

Bloggo Orchestrale: Another Visit to the GSO

Budding
music critic Dotore Gianni strikes again! And the third time, they say, is the
charm. A week ago I had yet another fine musical experience, this time at a
concert featuring the full Greenville Symphony Orchestra (GSO), and I’d like to
tell you a bit about it.

This
was the first concert I attended in the large Peace Center Concert Hall,

The Peace Center

with 2100 seats larger than any Broadway theatre. The largest of those is the
Uris, with 1933 seats. So the Peace Center is a large venue, and an
acoustically fine one, at least to my relatively inexperienced ears. In
Broadway houses, which I DO know well, everything is mixed electronically,
vocals, dialogue, orchestra, and it always takes me a fewminutes to stop
hating the “canned” aspect of the sound, no matter how well canned it is. Oh for the days of Ethel Merman, no
microphones at all, when singers just belted out over the pit orchestra, when
orchestrations were managed so that audiences could hear singers even when they
didn’t have voices like Merman’s, which was gigantic. When I think of her
singing a song like “Blow, Gabriel, Blow” from Anything Goes – wow!

However,
I have strayed slightly from my topic. (No, really, Dottore Gianni? Not you,
surely!)

Let’s
just say that I take great pleasure in listening to an un-amplified and
excellent orchestra in a large concert hall. The pieces that Maestro Tchivzhel
chose for the 2100 seat concert hall at the Peace Center certainly suited that
space and certainly suited the full GSO as well. The concert was titled “German
Giants” and giants of classical music all three of them are. Beethoven,
Mendelssohn and Brahms are names that anyone at all familiar with the classical
repertoire instantly recognizes. I was certainly excited to hear work by these
masters and had rather high expectations when I entered the theatre,
particularly after the wonderful experience I’d had just two weeks earlier at
the concert of chamber music by a more compact version of the GSO. All expectations
were met, and at one point at least exceeded.

The
Maestro opened the concert with…well I was going to write “Beethoven” but in
fact I was surprised when he turned to the audience, indicated for us to stand,
and led the orchestra in a full-bodied “Star Spangled Banner!” Actually my old
pal Bruce Halverson had mentioned this to me, as Tchivzhel begins every full
orchestra concert with this piece. Those of you who read my blog on my first
encounter with Tchivzhel, in the Oktoberfest concert a few weeks ago, may be
able to guess why. To remind those readers and to let others in on the probable
reason, the conductor is Russian and began his career in the mid-1970s in St
Petersburg, then known as Leningrad, for the Soviet revolutionary and first
leader. Tchivzhel gained a reputation in venues throughout that great city,
including the Mariinsky Theatre, at the time called the Kirov, for the popular
soviet leader who was assassinated, many believe by a jealous Stalin. In 1992
the name reverted to Mariinsky, named at its conception in 1860 for the Russian
Empress Maria Alexandrovna. Mariinsky…a much nicer name than Kirov, don’t you
think? It was and remains one of the great and among the most beautiful venues
for opera and ballet in the world. I was lucky enough to see a ballet there in
November 2000 – memorable!

The
theatre historian in Dottore Gianni caused above minor diversion, which he will
resist the strong urge to continue. It can however be linked to Tchivzhel, in
that after establishing his reputation in St Petersburg he became known in
wider circles, first in Soviet Russian then in satellites of the Soviet Union,
and towards the end of the Soviet era to western venues as well. In 1991 while
on a tour of the U.S., Tchivzhel defected to this country, aided largely by
friends in Greenville, S.C. The Maestro is a very patriotic American and
insists on beginning each concert of the full symphony with our national
anthem.

I
will confess to being slightly put off by this. I’m not unpatriotic myself,
though patriotic zeal has led to super-nationalist leanings all too evident in
many citizens of this country and in many countries as well – overly
nationalistic feelings can lead ill-advisedly to ill-advised wars and from
there…well, that’s a story for another blog! Back to the concert! I was put off
a tad by the national anthem beginning a concert of classical music, as that
piece is far from classical and seems a better choice for the opening of
baseball games and such.

I
was also somewhat annoyed that instead of chatting with the audience as he had
done in the chamber concert, Tchivzhel was much more formal in this setting,
and addressed us not at all. So on two counts he and the orchestra had to win
me over, which to my relief they managed to do quickly and winningly in their
rendition of Beethoven’s Leonore
Overture no. 3, op. 72b.

Does
Dottore Gianni need to write a brief bio of one of the most famous of all
classical composers? What for? Nearly everyone in the world knows (and sings,
on occasion) the first four notes of his Fifth Symphony: Du-Du-Du-

DUHM!
Why bother? Well, because he wants to! But he’ll be frief:

Beethoven

Ludwig van B, composer of fiery Romantic
music, personality fiery and Romantic as well, was born in Bonn, 1770, died in
Vienna, 1827, studied under Franz Josef Haydn, became a virtuoso pianist,
entertaining aristocratic families as well as large audiences, began to go deaf
at the tender age of 26 but continued to play and to compose: 9 great
symphonies (the last ending with a brilliant chorale, the Ode to Joy), 5 piano
concerti, 32 piano sonatas (including the “Moonlight” and “Pathetique”), 16
string quartets, other pieces for orchestra and chorus including masses such as
the Missa Solemnis – and only ONE opera, called first Leonore, later Fidelio.

One
opera only, but a great one, about love to an extent, more about freedom. A
political prisoner, Florestan, is rescued after much ado from a deep dungeon by
his wife, Leonore, who disguises herself as a male prison guard named Fidelio.
I used this opera in my Performing Arts and the French Revolution class. “Why?”
you may well ask, “It’s set in Spain, and written by a German.” To which I’d
respond, “Yes, but Beethoven’s opera was an adaptation of the libretto for the
1798 opera Léonore, ou L’amour conjugal written by Jean-Nicolas Bouilly,
a French writer and supporter of the Revolution.” I’d also say, though this
time I’ll dispense with the quotation marks, that Fidelio is one of several operas
set in Spain but meant to read as somewhere else. Beaumarchais’s play The Marriage of Figaro (produced 1784)
and later Mozart’s opera (1786, albeit less political than the play) is a case
in point – Figaro can be read in part
as a proto-revolutionary, and Louis XVI tried to ban the play, saying:

“Detestable!…This
play must never be given. The man mocks everything that should be respected in
the government. The Bastille would have
to be torn down before the presentation of this play could be anything but a
dangerous folly.” (quoted in Marvin Carlson’s The
Theatre of the French Revolution, Prologue)

But
others objected, saying that the play must be produced. One of the most vocal
was Marie Antoinette…whoops!

And
the legendary revolutionary Georges Danton, said this:

“If Figaro killed the aristocracy, Charles IX will kill the royalty.” (quoted in Marvin Carlson’s The Theatre of the French Revolution,
Prologue)

Danton
was speaking of another revolutionary play, Charles IX, performed shortly after
the Revolution began in 1789, but the point here is that Figaro the play WAS in fact a catalyst for the French Revolution,
and Figaro the opera was trimmed of
political sentiment by librettist Lorenzo da Ponte, who knew that were it not
self-censored, the rulers of Hapsburg Vienna would either censor or ban it
outright.

Yes,
Dottore Gianni, you loquacious as well as sagacious fellow, but get to the
OVERTURE, which methinks is what you wanted to write about before you embarked
on this pedantic aside!

Right!
While Beethoven wrote only one opera, he felt the need to compose four
different overtures for it. All are variations on the same piece, but Leonore
Overture no. 1 op 138 was judged a failure at an audition viewing of the opera
before Prince Lichnowsky. Leonore No 2 op 72a was a variation that was actually
used at the 1805 premiere, but was thought too complex for the audience, though
the opera itself was a very complicated and innovative piece of music. Number
3, op. 72b, the one we heard last week, is the most famous of all, frequently
played in concert halls today, and acknowledges as a master work, but brilliant
as it is, it too was found too complicated in 1805. One newspaper critic said
of it, “No one has yet written such incoherent music, ostentatious, chaotic and
disturbing for the ear…” And even the composer Cherubini, who worked on the
production, admitted that he could not establish its tonality due to the
multitude of modulations. Number 4, op. 72c, is the overture Beethoven wrote
for performances in 1814, and is today the one that is generally played before
the opera. Interestingly, Gustav Mahler, who like other conductors respected
Beethoven’s final choice, number 4, admired number 3 and performed it between
the two scenes of act two, as a sort of reprise of the rescue which had just
taken place. This practice was followed for some time, but while there are
exceptions, is now seldom performed within the opera.

(http://www.all-about-beethoven.com/overtures.html
and Wikipedia)

How’s
that for a complicated bit of operatic/music history? And now, what you’ve all
been waiting for: Dottore Gianni’s review! Here it is: I liked it very much,
particularly the blistering pace of the final moments of the overture,
finishing it with a dramatic flourish and bravura.

Hmmm…if
you look quickly again at the review and then scroll up to see how many words
are used in the lead-up to it, you will see clearly that the good doctor is a
much more able historian than a critic, and more interested in description than
critique. So it goes and so it will probably continue.

On
now to the Mendelssohn, his famous Symphony no. 4, op. 90 in A major, known as
the “Italian” Symphony. Felix Mendelssohn (1808-1847 – not a long life) is a
composer I enjoy, but about whom, musically as well as biographically I know
not much. I am most familiar with his music written as accompaniment to
Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream,

Mendelssohn

commissioned for a performance of the play in 1843 which was directed by
innovative Geman director Ludwig Tieck. Mendelssohn had written an overture for
the play in the 1820s, and now incorporated that music into the incidental
music and songs he created for the Tieck production. The Wedding March that the
composer penned is still played at weddings today. It’s that or Wagner’s,
unless you’re more adventurous in your choice of music for matrimonials. For a
long time, traditional productions of Midsummer
utilized what Gary Jay Williams, my theatre history professor at Catholic University, where I received my M.A. in Theatre History, used to
call “moonlight and Mendelssohn” – Max Reinhardt’s 1935 film version certainly
does (as well as utilizing Mickey Rooney as Puck, James Cagney as Bottom, and
other interesting casting choices – oi!). Then along came Peter Brook in 1970 and dusted the cobwebs off the play and its productions, setting the whole thing in a great white box, which revolutionized...oh!

We’re not talking about Midsummer, are we? We’re talking about Mendelssohn and his
Italian Symphony, Dottore! Mendelssohn’s background is fascinating but so
complicated that I’ll only refer you to the net, Wikipedia will do in this
case, as he was born a Jew, but his family was in denial about it, changed its
name to Bartholdy, and became Lutherans – more about this I will not say now,
except that Felix, while remaining Christian, valued his Jewish background more
than most of his family. He was a child prodigy at the piano, some have said
second only to Mozart, whereas the great German writer and thinker Johann
Wolfgang von Goethe, who heard them both, thought Mendelssohn’s the greater
talent. Early in his career Mendelssohn, with assistance from his friend Ludwig
Devrient, one of the great stars of nineteenth century German theatre,
conducted a performance of Bach’s B Minor Mass, the first production since Bach’s
death, nearly 100 years before. At the time of production, 1829, Bach’s music
had fallen into neglect and it’s frequently said that the apparently great
performance of a definitely great piece of music led to a revival of interest
in the composer. In one of the few open references Mendelssohn made to his
religious background he said something to the effect of “It took an actor
[Devrient] and a Jew [Mendelssohn] to revive the music of the greatest
Christian composer.”

In
addition to an Italian Symphony and Midsummer, Mendelssohn wrote an equally
popular “Scottish” Symphony, several concerti and chamber music pieces, along
with two oratorios, St Paul and Elijah, both influenced by Bach, several
songs, some set to poems by Goethe, and the interesting “Songs without Words,”
solo piano pieces of extreme beauty and popularity. He was, in short, one of
the great Romantic composers. His music was ignored to a point by an
increasingly anti-semitic public, even by fellow composers (Richard Wagner
damned his music with faint praise just three years after Mendelssohn’s death)
and the Nazi regime banned all performances and publications of his work. Even
in the 1960s more than 700 of his works remained unpublished, but in the last
50 years his star is shining again.

It
certainly does in the Italian Symphony, the result of a visit to Italy in
1820-31. The rather slim notes on it in the GSO’s season program call it a
“sunny” symphony, and I suppose that’s not unfair, though it’s a more
complicated piece than that. The difference from a “sunny” first movement to
what I’d call a rather dark second movement is pronounced. The first three
movements are marked more or less traditionally, but the fourth reads:
“Saltarello, Presto.” Presto is not at all unusual, but saltarello requires a
bit of explanation, and is probably the most Italian aspect to this Italian
Symphony. The saltarello is a lively Neapolitan dance, played in rapid meter,
that is characterized by leaping steps. The word saltarello as Dottore Gianni
knows well, comes from the Italian verb “saltare” which means to jump. And jump
the last movement does! Maestro Tchivzhel took presto to a near prestissimo, so
much so that the woman seated next to me whispered, just as it finished, to her
partner, “I’ve never heard it taken so fast!” She seemed nearly breathless. It
was a great finish to the first half of the concert.

After
intermission we settled in to hear the full power of the orchestra, with the
Symphony no. 1 op. 68 in C minor by Johannes Brahms. Brahms is a composer who
strikes me as a tad ponderous at times, more than a little academic in his
approach. Indeed one of his pieces is the Academic Festival Overture (heh heh),
which ends rousingly making brilliant use of the old college drinking song, Gaudeamus Igitur (Let us rejoice,
therefore!). The lyrics of the first verse should give you an idea of the
“sieze the day” theme of the song:

Let
us rejoice, therefore,

While
we are young.

After
a pleasant youth

After
a troubling old age

The
earth will have us.

As
one who is entering the “troubling old age” phase, I can’t help but agree with
the sentiments. Anyway, here is an instance when Brahms reaches beyond academic
tedium into the sublime, sophisticating a simple song into a triumphant
orchestral finale. He dazzles similarly, and then some, in the last movement of
Brahms’s Symphony no. 1.

But
readers! You’re not getting off the hook without a brief bio! Brahms
(1833-1897) was born into poverty in Hamburg Germany. To ease his family’s
financial burdens, when he was an adolescent Brahms played piano music in dance
halls. While this “shocking” portion of his life was played down by his early
biographers (“people don’t DO such things), it’s been suggested that the
composer’s early contact with dance halls and those who frequented them was
partly to blame for his failure to sustain relationships with women, and for
the fact that he never married.

Brahms

He
certainly rose above his impoverished status as a youth. Composer Robert Schumann became
aware of his work when he was only 20 and predicted that the young Brahms “’was
destined to give ideal expression to his times.’” This flattering remark, which implied that Brahms would become the next Beethoven, may
have added to Brahms’s perfectionism, which led him to re-write often and
destroy that which he thought inferior in his work. He did not want to disappoint Schumann, and for that matter the world. He remained friends with
Schumann, but more interesting was the relationship between Brahms and
Schumann’s wife Clara, a virtuoso pianist, with whom Brahms, 14 years her
junior, carried on a passionate relationship. Brahms’s father had married a
woman 17 years his senior…perhaps this obsession with older women ran in the
family? Whatever you think of that insightful analysis by Dottore Gianni, after
Robert Schumann’s death Brahms moved in to an apartment in Clara’s house and
spent two years there. The exact nature of their relationship remains unclear,
primarily because the two of them burned their letters to each other. Could it
have been romantic? In a Romantic era it was certainly possible.

In
spite of this dalliance, if that it was, Brahms became one of the best respected
composers of the late nineteenth century, famous for symphonies as well as
chamber music, for many songs (lieder), for secular and religious choral work, partiularly the German Requiem, and maybe most famous for his Hungarian Dances.

Stylistically
Brahms greatly admired earlier composers Mozart and Haydn (well, who wouldn’t?)
and he wished to bring classical order that they represented into Romantic
music. His excellence at counterpoint he owed to an extent by studying Bach,
who practically invented the technique. Above all he adored Beethoven and was
said to have walked like him, with his hands behind his back. Like Beethoven he
was sarcastic and short with other people and frequently alienated them. And
like his idol, Brahms loved to take walks in the forests.

Here
we come to a KEY component of this post, for Dottore Gianni sang in his high
school chorus, where among many types of music, tacky arrangements of show
tunes, embarrassing “Negro” spirituals written dialect and sung with gusto by
an all white group of students singers, and so on, there were at times songs by
classical composers. One of Dottore Gianni’s very favorites of these was a song
with music by Brahms called, “Wondrous Cool, Thou Woodland Quiet,” in the
original German “Waldesnacht du Wunderkuhle.”
Why is it key? Because it’s about ME, you silly readers, it’s about me!
(IF and it’s a big IF, any of you are still reading at this point!)

Was
that the good doctor’s introduction to Brahms? Possibly, though being an
intellectual snob in high school Dottore Gianni may well have already been
introduced to this composer, who has been referred to as one of the “three B’s”
of classical music, along with Bach and Beethoven. At any rate, Brahms’s
woodland wanderings led to beautiful music such as was written for that song.

Not
long after high school, during his time in the U.S. Air Force, Dottore Gianni
had a great friend named Ernest Harper, who was, like the doctor,

Ernest Harper

aRussian linguist. Near the end of the
1960s they moved with another airman, Brian Chase to an apartment in Silver
Spring, MD, right on the DC/MD border that had belonged just before to the
doctor’s sister and her first husband. Brian enjoyed contemporary music, but
Ernest and the doctorloved classical
music, and the two of them bought the least expensive subscription (we were after all starving airmen) to concerts
by the National Symphony, conducted at that time by Antal Dorati, at the D.A.R. Constitution Hall, and there they heard Brahms,
more than once. Brahms became one of Ernest’s very favorite composers, and he
bought all of Brahms’s symphonies on vinyl discs. What else were there in those days? So we heard a lot of Brahms
during those years.

Alas
Ernest died young, of AIDS, really before the disease had been named. None of
us, not even Brian and I, knew that he was gay during the time we were living
together. We threw big parties every other weekend, but they were very
heterosexually oriented (also very oriented towards marijuana, but that’s
another story). At some point of the evening Ernest would excuse himself,
saying he wanted to take a drive. Drive he did, down to the Foggy Bottom
neighborhood of DC, which at the time (and who knows? Maybe still today) was an
area in which young gay men could meet. Was it then that he contracted AIDS?
Perhaps not, but it gnaws at Dottore Gianni to this day that one of his best
friends was gay and was afraid to tell him.

Ah
well, here’s to Brahms! Not just in memory of J. Ernest Harper, but certainly
partly so. Rest in peace, both of you.

Continuing
the admiration for and imitation of Beethoven on Brahms’s part, it took the
composer longer than most to tackle a full symphony. Not that he wasn’t already
a fine composer. His beautiful German Requiem, which put him on the map
musically, was completed in 1869. It was obvious that he could tackle major
compositions, but his Symphony no. 1 was not performed until 1876. According to
the GSO program notes Brahms told a friend once: “I shall never write a
symphony. You have no idea how people like me feel when we hear the steps of a
giant like him [Beethoven] behind us."

Fortunately for us he DID write a symphony, four in
fact. Brahms’s first symphony has often been called Beethoven’s Tenth! There are
several reasons for this, and Dottore Gianni would explain them if they didn’t
fly right over his head in terms of understanding! But one connection is clear,
even to the good doctor. The fourth movement is marked in a more complicated
manner than are the first three: Adagio; Piu Andante; Allegro non Troppo, ma
con brio – translated that would be: slow and stately; then a walking pace, but
a little more quickly than normal (piu); next fast, quickly and bright, not too
much so (non troppo), but (ma) with vigor and spirit (con brio).

While
Brahms knows how to use the full orchestra, and while Tchivzhel certainly knows
how to make the best use of the GSO, I found the first three movements, some of
which were familiar to me (thanks Ernest!) fine, and certainly well played, but
as I noted above, a bit ponderous. The fourth, on the other hand, is one of
those “best of Brahms” movements. It begins slowly, ominously even, but segues
from C Minor (remember, the full title of the piece is Symphony no. 1 op. 68 in
C minor) to C Major. It’s a stunning transition, as the program notes state,
“as if the sun were bursting through dark clouds,” and it’s at this point that
the main theme of the final movement is introduced. I’ll quote the notes again:
“a hymn-like melody that recalls Beethoven’s ‘Ode to Joy’” – and if the reader
will recall where the “Ode to Joy” comes from – it’s the final movement of
Symphony no. 9. Thus, Beethoven’s Tenth!

The
program notes tell us that when a friend of Brahms pointed out that this
portion of the movement reminded him of the “Ode to Joy” Brahms snapped back “Any
fool can see that!” And Dottore Gianni qualifies, if not as a music critic, as
any fool. The music builds, develops and then simply soars. Brahms for people
who hate Brahms. What a grand way to end a movement, a symphony, a concert.

It’s
left me more than ready for more, and more I’ll get next week, in fact at precisely this time, as I end this post, exactly one week from today, when it’s back
down to chamber concert level, an all-Mozart program at the Gunter Theatre. This will not be hard to
take because, like Brahms adored Beethoven, Dottore Gianni adores Mozart.

Admission:
I don’t know if anyone is actually reading this, and I don’t really care. I
know a lot about theatre history, but I resolved to teach myself more about art
history and music history in these my declining years. Going to the concerts
and then researching and writing about them is proving a wonderful and active
way to learn more about music. I’ve worked pretty much all day yesterday and
today – nearly 4 pm – time for tea! And while it’s for no really useful
purpose, it’s been if not an ode, a joy.